The buzz over proposals to tighten US visa rules caused a furore this week, with the move being interpreted as the death knell for India’s $150-billion IT outsourcing industry. However, for many Indian tech majors, this isn’t really breaking news because they’ve known for a while that US visa laws are a game of political roulette.

For nearly a decade, companies such as Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, and Wipro, which get over 60% of their revenue from the US, have been bracing themselves for such tightening of laws. And in recent years, these efforts have intensified significantly.

In 2016, TCS, India’s largest IT outsourcing company, applied for only 4,000 new US visas, as against 14,000 in 2015, N Chandrasekaran, the company’s outgoing CEO and Tata Sons’ chairman-designate, said last month. TCS was granted only around 1,300 visas that year.

“There is a lot of commentary (recently) about the increase in the visa fee…(and) the number of visas one will get. We are addressing both very proactively. In terms of the number of visas that we will get, we decided more than a year ago that we have to operate in a visa-constraint regime,” Chandrasekaran said. “We are able to successfully execute (our orders) by making changes to our business model. So we believe that we are preparing ourselves well to handle the headwind should it arise.”

The hanging sword

Bills to tighten H-1B visa rules have been floated in the US Congress for years. The H-1B allows foreign workers to work in the US for up to six years. The programme has often been criticised for opening up a pipeline of cheap labor at the cost of US-bred engineers.

India’s IT outsourcing industry, which accounts for around 9.5% of the country’s GDP and employs nearly 3.7 million professionals, has in the past faced federal fines and investigations over its use of US visas. In 2013, Infosys paid a hefty $34 million to settle one such case. This was the largest payout by any company for an alleged civil fraud over visas.

Last week, the issue picked up steam again when a bipartisan bill, first introduced in 2007 and aimed at revamping the visa programme, was reintroduced. In addition, Democratic Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren submitted her own bill, called the High-Skilled Integrity and Fairness Act of 2017 (pdf), which, among other restrictions,called to significantly raise the minimum wage that applicants of such visasmust earn in order to qualify.

Restricting the visa programme is a blow to Indian IT companies, for long the main beneficiaries of H-1B visas (pdf). While there is so far no official word on any changes to the visa programme by the US government, these firms are already beginning to feel the heat with their shares taking a beating.

However, immigration experts say the number of H-1B applications filed does not necessarily reflect the real story.

The US grants only 85,000 such visas a year. Authorities receive almost three times as many applications and a random computerised lottery picks from the applicant pool. This means that less than 30% applicants actually secure H-1B visas.

“Even in recent years, it appears that IT companies did not really need all the H-1B visas that they were filing petitions for. Companies were prone to apply for more than what they needed in order to increase their chances of getting their petitions selected in the lottery system,” said Poorvi Chothani, managing partner at Mumbai-based LawQuest, a global immigration law firm.

At the same time, Chothani, who works with several Indian IT firms on immigration-related issues, notes that these firms have also been preparing for an alternative future.

Years of prep

To gradually reduce the impact of a change in US visa norms on their business, Indian companies have begun investing in “near-shore centers” – facilities close to the US – and also increasing local hiring in America.

In 2009, Wipro began ramping up hiring in the US. “We have already started to react (to proposed changes in visa norms). We anticipated this. We started ramping up our Atlanta center with local hires, fresh from campus. We’re doing the same thing in Troy, Michigan,” Wipro chairman Azim Premji said in a 2009 interview with BusinessWeek.

Fearing immigration reforms, TCS followed suit in 2013, saying it would make more efforts to hire American graduates. In recent years, Infosys has gone all out to attract American talent. In fact, its current CEO, Vishal Sikka, is a Stanford-educated American national.

In all, 100 Indian companies in the US – 40% belonging to the IT industry – had created more than 91,000 jobs there, a 2015 survey (pdf) by the Confederation of Indian Industry shows.

Indian IT companies have also been spending on acquisitions in the US to increase local manpower. In November 2016, Wipro’s chief financial officer, Jatin Dalal, and Tech Mahindra’s chief executive, CP Gurnani, both said they are on the lookout for possible acquisitions.

But one key challenge in this strategy is the shortage of skilled Americans. In December 2016, a survey of over 1,000 hiring managers and recruiters by jobs site Indeed revealed that almost nine in 10 respondents found it hard to discover and hire technical talent in the US.

TCS and Infosys declined to comment for this story. Wipro did not respond to an email from Quartz.

Changing business model

Another approach is to work virtually, which is becoming easier with the wider adoption of cloud servicesand greater digitisation, meaning fewer employees are required in the US. Indian IT companies have been pushing American clients to adopt more virtual services and that’s making a big difference.

“The ‘Plan B’ would be to accelerate the trend…to reduce their reliance on people and increase their focus on delivering automation, leveraging the cloud for their clients,” said Partha Iyengar, Gartner’s head of research in India.

After all, Donald Trump could regulate the number of people allowed into the US, but legislating against bots in the cloud will be much tougher.

“You can only punish the legacy business for ripping out cost, but not the emerging business for building their global support infrastructure,” Phil Fersht, chief analyst at research firm HfS Research, wrote in a LinkedIn post.

The right machine can save water, power consumption, time, energy and your clothes from damage.

In 2010, Han Rosling, a Swedish statistician, convinced a room full of people that the washing machine was the greatest invention of the industrial revolution. In the TED talk delivered by him, he illuminates how the washing machine freed women from doing hours of labour intensive laundry, giving them the time to read books and eventually join the labour force. Rosling’s argument rings true even today as it is difficult to deny the significance of the washing machine in our everyday lives.

For many households, buying a washing machine is a sizable investment. Oddly, buyers underestimate the importance of the decision-making process while buying one and don’t research the purchase as much as they would for a television or refrigerator. Most buyers limit their buying criteria to type, size and price of the washing machine.

Visible technological advancements can be seen all around us, making it fair to expect a lot more from household appliances, especially washing machines. Here are a few features to expect and look out for before investing in a washing machine:

Cover your basics

Do you wash your towels every day? How frequently do you do your laundry? Are you okay with a bit of manual intervention during the wash cycle? These questions will help filter the basic type of washing machine you need. The semi-automatics require manual intervention to move clothes from the washing tub to the drying tub and are priced lower than a fully-automatic. A fully-automatic comes in two types: front load and top load. Front loading machines use less water by rotating the inner drum and using gravity to move the clothes through water.

Simple steps to get the best from your washing machineSimple steps to get the best from your washing machineSimple steps to get the best from your washing machine

Size matters

The size or the capacity of the machine is directly proportional to the consumption of electricity. The right machine capacity depends on the daily requirement of the household. For instance, for couples or individuals, a 6kg capacity would be adequate whereas a family of four might need an 8 kg or bigger capacity for their laundry needs. This is an important factor to consider since the wrong decision can consume an unnecessary amount of electricity.

Machine intelligence that helps save time

In situations when time works against you and your laundry, features of a well-designed washing machine can come to rescue. There are programmes for urgent laundry needs that provide clean laundry in a super quick 15 to 30 minutes’ cycle; a time delay feature that can assist you to start the laundry at a desired time etc. Many of these features dispel the notion that longer wash cycles mean cleaner clothes. In fact, some washing machines come with pre-activated wash cycles that offer shortest wash cycles across all programmes without compromising on cleanliness.

The green quotient

Despite the conveniences washing machines offer, many of them also consume a substantial amount of electricity and water. By paying close attention to performance features, it’s possible to find washing machines that use less water and energy. For example, there are machines which can adjust the levels of water used based on the size of the load. The reduced water usage, in turn, helps reduce the usage of electricity. Further, machines that promise a silent, no-vibration wash don’t just reduce noise – they are also more efficient as they are designed to work with less friction, thus reducing the energy consumed.

Customisable washing modes

Crushed dresses, out-of-shape shirts and shrunken sweaters are stuff of laundry nightmares. Most of us would rather take out the time to hand wash our expensive items of clothing rather than trusting the washing machine. To get the dirt out of clothes, washing machines use speed to first agitate the clothes and spin the water out of them, a process that takes a toll on the fabric. Fortunately, advanced machines come equipped with washing modes that control speed and water temperature depending on the fabric. While jeans and towels can endure a high-speed tumble and spin action, delicate fabrics like silk need a gentler wash at low speeds. Some machines also have a monsoon mode. This is an India specific mode that gives clothes a hot rinse and spin to reduce drying time during monsoons. A super clean mode will use hot water to clean the clothes deeply.

Washing machines have come a long way, from a wooden drum powered by motor to high-tech machines that come equipped with automatic washing modes. Bosch washing machines include all the above-mentioned features and provide damage free laundry in an energy efficient way. With 32 different washing modes, Bosch washing machines can create custom wash cycles for different types of laundry, be it lightly soiled linens, or stained woollens. The ActiveWater feature in Bosch washing machines senses the laundry load and optimises the usage of water and electricity. Its EcoSilentDrive motor draws energy from a permanent magnet, thereby saving energy and giving a silent wash. The fear of expensive clothes being wringed to shapelessness in a washing machine is a common one. The video below explains how Bosch’s unique VarioDrumTM technology achieves damage free laundry.